Cursive Handwriting

Teachers here on PT have great ideas for cursive writing! This collection has some of these ideas neatly rolled up into one.

Teaching Cursive Writing
Posted by:Betsy #29269

I enjoy teaching my students cursive because they are generally excited about learning something new. Here are the things I do to teach cursive:

**The first day of cursive practice I asked the kids to watch me write a word on the overhead two times. The first time I wrote in regular print and the second time I wrote in cursive. Then I asked the class what they noticed different about the way I wrote the words. Students noticed that the second word had letters looped together, some said the cursive word was "prettier", and others noticed that I did not pick up my pen until I had written the entire word when I wrote in cursive. This of course is what I was hoping to hear. We talked about the fact that cursive writing can be faster because you do not have to continually pick up your pencil. We also...

I begin each year with a cursive letter of the day as part of morning work. I give the kids a piece of lined handwriting paper before they arrive, and I write the letter on the board with instructions for the kids to write two lines of the letter. When the kids sat down to write, they could see several small steps for forming the letter on the board, so that they could remember how the letter was formed. By the time I have finished taking lunch money and attendance, I was ready to go over the kids' morning work, which was a few math problems, then I showed them slowly, step by step (as if they had never heard it before. I collect all morning work. The whole process of going over a letter a day doesn't drain your academic schedule.

In Grade 3, start from the very beginning. Sometimes, you will get new students who did not have cursive in Grade 2. Students forget over the summer. Start from scratch. Students have difficult times with many of the connectives: br, os, mn, etc. 3rd graders are great in writing one syllable words. . .they need practice in writing longer words and sentences. Take your time with practice. Have them "picture frame" their best letters in each row of practice. Have them write in the air, on their "palm pilots" (on the palms of hands), on desktops to get the feel of the letters and their connectives. For practice papers, make models with orange markers to that the kids can trace them. At times, let them do their practice in marker. . .the markers pen glide easily over paper since cursive letters glide and flow together.

I've been teaching cursive for over 25 years without a workbook, and I'll post my order (using Zaner Bloser) for anyone who is being asked to teach it with no reference, as often seems to be the case. I always start having them write their letters two-spaces high so they have that middle guide line to use.

Start with the lower case letters. There are several "families" of letters. I teach the families in this order: Under Curves (l, i, t, e, h, r, s, b, j, u, k, p, w, f), Over Curves (n, m, y, v, z, x), and Down Curves (a, c, g, d, o, q). I try to start with easier letters first so they don't get discouraged. There are also various tricky connection which I teach as needed. The various "hook" connections(br, be, or, os, wr, etc.) can be a real...

I do 5 mins a day and teach lower case. We 'air write' first to get the muscles warm. Then proper position for writing. They observe me do it. I have an overhead with the dotted line paper and my cursive has improved! They practice one letter a day! So far I have kept on track and they should be writing all cursive by the middle of Jan.

I teach third grade. We are using "handwriting without tears". I do not allow my students to write in cursive outside of our cursive lessons at this point because we have not introduced all letters. The program begins with the lowercase letters and teaches the capitals last. The idea being we use lowercase letters most frequently. The program also is very basic in the letter formation. The belief here being to teach the students a simple style which they can later add their own fancy flair to. The program consists of a teacher's guide and a workbook and is very cheap.

Once I have introduced all letters I will allow students to write in cursive (after Christmas). I think I will still ask for printing on tests so that their effort can be spent on answering the question not perfecting their handwriting. I think...

I have a cursive book that has a half page of practice for every day of the week. I copy the whole week's work and give the packet to the students on Monday. It is due on Friday (before they can play!).

My children have been taught cursive in previous years, but still make many errors.

I analyze their packets on the weekend and meet with them individually on Monday morning to give them a "cursive prescription" for the new week. This is just 1 skill that I want them to focus on improving.

For example, I had a child this week who was making her f's and t's half the height they should be. I spent a minute showing her how to do it and it is what she will be looking out for this week.

Another student has letter formation down, but her writing slants every...

I use a program called "Loops" (I recieved it from our school Occupational Therapist). The letters are divided into sections. The first one is called "clock climbers". These letters all basically start the same way (like tracing around a clock).....a, d, g, c, q. Next are "kite strings".....i, u, y (this is all I have done so far so I don't remember the rest). When I began teaching handwriting we discussed the basic parts of the different lines. I referred to it as a house. The writing line is called the main floor. Then you have the upstairs and basement. I only teach one letter a day...then they practice it (2 rows). Once we learn all the letters I will give them words. Hopefully in June we can copy some poetry.

Lowercase:
c (called the magic c)
cadg (made with magic c)
htp (familiar from printing)
elf (this group doesn't look like printed letters)
uyij (look like priniting- made with similar strokes)
krs (challenging group)
owbv(called tow-truck letters because they don't end at bottom line)
mn (bumps and bumps are tricky)
xzq (infrequently used and can be challenging)

We do what we call "Thoughtful Thursday". They draw names each Thursday morning and then write a short note in cursive to that person. This is all done independently and takes very little thought on my part! The supplies are out on a shelf and every Thursday they just do it without any reminders from me. Their notes go in a large box. I peek at them to check them out and to check the handwriting and then the star student of the week passes them out during snack time.

When I taught second grade and introduced cursive handwriting to my class, I found these incentives to be very helpful:

I laminated a sheet of posterboard and titled it with the caption "Handwriting Hall of Fame". I would be sure to give every child a chance to be in the Handwriting Hall of Fame, but I would choose extra neat papers to display weekly in the hallway outside our classroom. It was a real hit.

Also, I designed a "permit" and a "Handwriting License" for each of my students. At the beginning of the year, the students completed information on a special form as an application for a "Permit". Students had to provide their full name, hair and eye color, birthdate, and room number on the permit application.

Once a student demonstrated neat and legible handwriting, I issued a "Handwriting License" (I designed it to look like a driver's license)....